1.   After a contentious debate, members of the committee finally voted to approve the funding.

2.   The most contentious debate had centred on the issue of religious education.

3.   And increasingly, such an undertaking involves contentious debates about race, gender, ethnicity and sexual orientation.

4.   Authors of the report hope that it will provide fodder for what is expected to be a contentious debate over funds for abortion when Congress returns next month.

5.   Bobzien, meanwhile, seems resigned to the contentious debate.

6.   A big beer campaign that is stirring contentious debate has caused a rift between a hot creative agency and a leading trade publication.

7.   After a contentious debate in the weeks before its passage, the North American trade agreement faded as an issue, costing Clinton little.

8.   Ahead is a contentious debate over who will provide the trillions of dollars in savings needed to keep the federal retirement and disability system running through the next century.

9.   Bullock said he will name a task force by November to find ways of resolving contentious racial debates that he said threaten to block progress in the Legislature.